


Glycerine

by cadenzamuse



Series: '36 Hudson [1]
Category: Roswell New Mexico (TV 2019)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Background Alex Manes/Michael Guerin, But it's gonna be pretty gen for a while y'all, Endgame Malex, Gen, Graphic Depiction of Physical Abuse, Graphic Depiction of Trauma, Heavy Angst, Homelessness, Jesse Manes is Abusive, M/M, PTSD, Post-Episode: s01e06 Smells Like Teen Spirit
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-06-19
Updated: 2019-12-10
Packaged: 2020-05-14 23:13:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 4
Words: 9,656
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19283161
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cadenzamuse/pseuds/cadenzamuse
Summary: Around the pain, Alex’s world feels slowed down and crystal clear.  Each thought leads to the next, a string of facts as cold and hard as diamonds.  Michael is long gone. If Alex goes near Michael again, Jesse will probably kill him.  Alex may deserve his father’s wrath, but Michael doesn’t. Alex has to get as far away from Michael as he can.  The Sergeant is right. This ends now.





	1. Prologue: This Ends Now

**Author's Note:**

> I'm avoiding job applications AND my KPBB fic. It's like multitasking!
> 
>  **This fic includes a frank depiction of Jesse Manes's battery of Michael Guerin, as well as Alex Manes's trauma reaction.** Please take care of yourself, and if you need more details, please let me know.
> 
> Based on average Air Force promotion timelines, since Jesse Manes is a Chief Master Sergeant in the present RNM timeline, he would likely have been a Technical Sergeant or Master Sergeant 10 years ago. I chose to make him a Technical Sergeant. Technical Sergeants are addressed as "Technical Sergeant" or just "Sergeant," which is why Alex calls his father by the informal military nickname "Sarge."
> 
> Goes AU after the hand incident near the end of S01E06.

_May 2008_

Tech Sergeant Manes brings the hammer down on Michael’s hand, and Alex feels something in himself snap along with Michael’s bones.  When Sarge turns to Alex, Michael runs. Alex feels himself drifting into that mental sanctuary he can sometimes find, where everything feels fuzzy and unreal.  Sarge is already slowing down, perhaps realizing that assaulting someone other than a Manes man might actually have consequences. Sarge tosses the bloody hammer aside, and Alex braces for the kicks and punches he knows are coming next, but he simply throws Alex on the ground.  “Later you’ll see this was for your own good,” he barks, and then he’s gone.

Around the pain, Alex’s world feels slowed down and crystal clear.  Each thought leads to the next, a string of facts as cold and hard as diamonds.  Michael is long gone. If Alex goes near Michael again, Sarge will probably kill him.  Alex may deserve his father’s wrath, but Michael doesn’t. Alex has to get as far away from Michael as he can.  The Sergeant is right. This ends now.

Alex creeps to his bedroom.  He is usually safe for a few days after a beating, since Sarge usually keeps his distance, but now would not be the time to find out that the routine has changed.  Alex can hear every shuffle and cough from his dad watching TV down in the den as loudly as if it was right next to him.

Alex’s thoughts are speeding up now, and he finds he’s trembling as he tries to scrub the nail polish off his fingernails as quickly as possible.  He’s practically pouring the acetone down the drain in his haste. Next he swipes at his eyes with a washcloth. The plugs come out of his ears, the septum ring out of his nose.  He doesn’t bother to collect them when the rings ping into his sink as he shucks them. He can get new ones when he gets where he’s going. Then to the backpack in his closet, checking through it quickly to make sure he hasn’t forgotten anything.  He’s not going to get out of the house with his guitar, but that’s fine, he can take his brother’s from the shed. iPod, phone charger, shit if he doesn’t put _something_ in his nose piercing will close, so put the barbell back in and just flip it up into his nostrils and hope nobody notices. Put on a flannel and loose jeans, the most butch clothes he can find.

By the time he finishes, it’s only 9pm.  He has another hour until curfew. Okay. Tiptoe down the stairs, out the back door, hope the Sarge is dozing in front of the TV.  He can barely make himself go back in the shed--no sign of Michael--but it’s not just the guitar, Alex keeps his money hidden there too, in the bottom of the futon cushion.  A couple hundred dollars should get him a bus ticket somewhere, Albuquerque, El Paso, fuck, even Lubbock or Odessa is at least _somewhere else_ , and he’ll figure out the rest when he gets there.

But Roswell is in the middle of fucking nowhere, and the bus station locks up tight at 5pm, just like everything else in this godforsaken town.  Alex has looked up the bus schedule before, actually, probably almost a million times, carefully deleting his browser history and cookies afterward like the Greyhound website is gay porn or something.  The next bus out isn’t until noon tomorrow, and by that point his dad will have figured out he’s not just breaking curfew. Alex doesn’t turn 18 for another month. He might as well have “Property of Technical Sergeant Jesse Manes” stamped across his forehead.  It’d look perfect with the collection of bruises, and, more to the point, Sheriff Valenti is going to check the bus records as soon as the missing persons report is filed and drag him right back home to his dad.

So.  Freight trains have to slow down in city limits, and there’s enough scrubby trees by the livestock auction, where the track switch is, that he can probably hide out until a train comes through.  Then hop on the first thing that comes through, doesn’t matter which way. Anywhere is better than here.


	2. Alex Manes's Father

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It’s two days after Max and Michael cover up Isobel killing Kate, Jasmine, and Rosa when Michael finds out that Alex Manes is missing.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks to the 18+ Discord and thorya for asking great world-building questions, estel_willow for hand-holding, and InsidiousIntent for a super-speedy, super-insightful beta.
> 
> Also, surprise! I know everyone wants to know what happened to Alex (and I promise we will get there next chapter), but the changes that Alex leaving causes to poor Michael wouldn't leave me alone. So the plan is to alternate between Alex and Michael's POVs every chapter.

_ Michael _

_ June 2008 _

 

It’s two days after Max and Michael cover up Isobel killing Kate, Jasmine, and Rosa when Michael finds out that Alex Manes is missing.  Michael is debating whether to hit an Albertsons or a Walgreens to steal some more acetone--or maybe the Ace Hardware?--when he gets a text from Max:  _ I need to talk to you. _

Max would not know the word “discretion” if it bit him in the ass, but he’s just gonna get more and more obvious until Michael gets in touch with him, and the last thing they need is someone paying attention to Max or Michael right now.   _ @fosters,  _ he sends back.  Michael has been in too much pain to really do his share of ranch chores, but he’s managed to duck Foster enough that he hasn’t been kicked off the property yet.

Max must really need to speak to him urgently, because it’s only 20 minutes before Michael can see the cloud of dust kicked up from an incoming car.  There’s not much to straighten when you’re living out of a truck, but Michael makes sure all the acetone empties are stuffed in his sleeping bag and eases his mangled hand into his jacket pocket so it won’t catch Max’s attention.

Max’s Jeep has barely skidded to a stop before Max leaps out.  “It wasn’t just them,” he gasps. Michael barely has half a second to try to picture where they could have overlooked a whole extra person when Max continues.  “Alex Manes is missing.”

Michael’s body turns to ice.  Distantly, he feels the part of himself that controls his powers get heavy and numb, clamped down tight the way it always does when he’s in danger.  His heart beats so loud and fast that he can feel it pulsing in his ears.

“Could we have missed him?” Max asks, crossing his arms.  “Is there some reason Isobel would have...dumped him somewhere?  That doesn’t sound like Isobel but that didn’t seem like her in that cave...shrine...thing either.  We can’t know for sure. And, I, there could be hundreds of caves, Michael, and they’re gonna start search parties soon.  The son of Tech Sergeant Manes doesn’t just  _ disappear. _   Well?  Aren’t you going to say something?”

Michael feels his hands curl into fists.  He barely manages to choke, “Do they know when?” before the tears start leaking out of his eyes.

Max pauses, the panic in his eyes turning to sympathy.  “I’m so sorry, Michael. I can’t imagine...I know you were, uh…you had a moment...”  Max crosses the distance to Michael in long strides, wraps his arms around him.

But Michael can’t feel Max’s hug, can’t process that Max knew about Alex and him.  Can barely feel anything other than the cool pinpricks where his tears sting his eyes.  “Do they know when?” he asks again.

“My mom said Saturday night, maybe?  Jesse Manes said he hadn’t seen his son since Saturday morning, but he didn’t think anything was wrong until Alex didn’t come back on Sunday.”

The ice in Michael’s veins turns fiery so fast that he thinks he might vomit.  Instead he scoffs a laugh. “Sure. Is that what Alex Manes’s dad said. Because no one would ever discount our very own hometown hero.”

Max’s brow furrows.  “What, you think he might be lying?”

“He was beating him, Max!  He thought Alex being gay was some kind of a--an abomination!  Some kind of defect stopping him from crushing Alex up and spitting him out as another perfect little soldier.  So yeah, I think Alex Manes’s father has just about every reason to lie about where he was, when he was--” Michael swallows hard “--when he died.”

 

*

 

Alex was alive ten days ago.  That’s how time works for Michael now, like it’s relentlessly pulling Michael further and further away from Alex, alive and warm in his arms.

Alex was alive ten days ago, and Max and Michael are no closer to finding him.  Michael has even snuck back to the shed, to find it scrubbed down with bleach. The guitar is gone, the walls bare of Danger! at the Picture Show posters.

“We should bring in Isobel,” Max says.  They’re sitting in the Crashdown. This was a mistake on Michael’s part, since Max keeps making sad hearteyes at Liz every time she walks by.  And it’s not Max’s fault that every time he does, Michael’s stomach clenches tighter. At this point, he can’t even eat the burger and fries Max bought him.

Liz, at least, isn’t noticing Max’s puppy dog eyes.  Her customer service smile is barely pasted on her face, and she walks slower, like she’s aged decades overnight.  Michael’s sad for her in a vague kind of way, knows she loved Alex too--honestly, probably way better than Michael did--but also relieved that she’s stopped looking back at Max.  It buys them some time, some safety for Isobel.

“Well?” Max asks.  “It’s been ten days.  There’s no evidence. None, Michael.  Do you know what the definition of insanity is?  Trying the same damn thing, over and over, and expecting different results.”

“We’re keeping Isobel safe,” Michael says.  “If we bring her in, she’s gonna find out, and it’s gonna break her.”

“Look, I know you, uh, cared about Alex, but maybe if we’re not finding anything, there isn’t anything to find.  Maybe it was Isobel, or maybe he just got lost in the desert. Maybe we need to cut our losses and concentrate on keeping each other safe.”

“Cut our losses?!  Alex is not, will never be, just a ‘loss.’  Max.” Michael lowers his voice. “What if it was Liz Ortecho, who was missing?  Would we be ‘cutting our losses’ then?”

Max coughs.  “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said that.  I know Alex is important to you. We can keep looking.  I just need you to think about what happens, if we can’t find anything.  You can’t let this, this vendetta against Jesse Manes consume your whole life.  Especially not now.”

“Look, he did it, Max, I know he did.  We just have to find  _ something _ .  Some small scrap we’ve missed.  And we’ll follow the trail, and then we’ll bring him in.”

“Tell me one thing.  Why are you  _ so sure  _ it was Sergeant Manes?  I know he’s a homophobe, but is there any  _ real _ reason?  I believe you!   I just need, I don’t know.  Something to go on.”

“What, him busting my hand into a million pieces not enough for you?”  Michael holds up the hand in question. It’s splinted semi-professionally, and it’s both a lot better and a lot worse than Michael is letting on.  It will definitely scar, and it's going to be ugly, but he conceded letting Max straighten some of the bones and start the process of knitting them back together--after all, if he's going to kill Alex Manes's father with his bare hands, he wants two hands to do it.  But the amount of acetone it still takes to kill the pain completely is enough to leave Michael loopy for hours, and he has to be sharp right now. Which means his hand hurts like a bitch basically all the time.

It’s almost funny to watch Max backpedal.  “I didn’t, I didn’t know. I figured you got in a fight or something.  Wait, why the hell did Jesse Manes attack you?”

“Caught us together, ah, let’s say, romantically.  Dude just--snapped. He was coming after Alex with a hammer, and I was stupid enough to step between ‘em.  Thought I was saving his life. Guess I just bought us both a little more pain.” Michael swallows against the tears in his eyes.

“Wow,” Max says quietly.  “We will get justice for Alex, Michael.  I promise.”

Michael can’t quite hold back his huff of skepticism.  “We haven’t found anything.  _ Anything. _   And every single day we don’t is another day for Alex’s dad to erase more of the trail.  Another day further away from finding him.”

Max shakes his head.  “We won’t let that happen.  Besides, there’s one place Manes can’t erase the trail.”  He taps his temple. “Like I said. I think we need to bring in Isobel.”

 

*

 

“I’m sorry, you want me to do what?” Isobel asks.

“We have reason to believe that Jesse Manes killed his own son and hid the body,” Max says again.  “We need you to go into his head and tell us where Alex is.”

“That’s--ridiculous.  Insane. Michael, tell Max that’s insane.”  Michael is too choked up to speak right this second, but he purses his lips and shakes his head at Isobel slowly.  She definitely reads something in his face, because her expression gets serious rapidly.

“You’re serious.”  

Michael nods grimly.

“Show me.”  Isobel’s eyes take on the glassy look that means she’s using her powers, the feeling of her mindscape prickling at the edges of Michael’s senses--

_ \--chipped black fingernail polish, thick hair running through his fingers, and pain.  Pain in his hand, pain in Alex’s eyes, pain in Michael’s heart as he sees Rosa die under Isobel’s hands.  So much pain he can’t let Isobel see-- _

\--Michael slams his power down on hers like a jar lid on thieving fingers.  His voice feels rusty, constricted. “Stay out, Isobel.”

“How do you expect me to understand if you won’t let me in?”  She makes an offended little eyebrow wriggle.

Heat rises behind Michael’s eyes.  “I don’t know, maybe you could  _ trust me _ ?  You’re the one always saying we’re  _ family _ \--”

“ _ Don’t _ hold that against me, Michael,” Isobel hisses.  Michael feels flooded with heat, his fingers tingling, clenching on air--

“Stop it!” Max yells.  “Both of you. We’re on the same side here.”  Michael and Isobel both snort, but subside.

“Now, Isobel, you asked for proof?” Max says, his voice taking on a familiar authoritative tone.  “Jesse Manes did that to Michael.” Max nods at Michael’s hand. “Over Alex. When Michael got between Alex and his dad with a hammer.”

Michael watches his sister’s face fall, watches the fear and pity flood in the way they always do when Michael says anything real about his life.  “Yeah,” he says dryly. “So now we need to find a dead body. And the guy who hid it was trained by the U.S. government to hide ‘em.”

 

*

 

“He hasn’t turned up on any credit card searches or security footage,” Isobel reports two days later.  “And no one has recognized him at truck stops.”

“Yeah, they wouldn’t if he’s dead,” Michael says.

“I’m just reporting what the sheriff’s department knows, don’t shoot the messenger.  It was annoyingly difficult to make sure I got everything out of Sheriff Valenti’s head, especially with all the extra people around the station.”

“Extra people?” Max asks.

“Originally Jesse Manes reported Alex as a runaway, but since none of those searches worked he counts as really missing now.  An entire brigade of Sergeant Manes’s base friends are there, acting like they run the sheriff’s department. Anyway, they’re starting a grid search tomorrow.  And they’re looking for volunteers, so I signed us up.” Isobel smiles beatifically.

“Nuh-uh,” Michael says.  “No way. I am not getting anywhere near that man, not again.  Or did you forget he did this?” Michael waves his splinted left hand in Isobel’s face.

“Don’t be ridiculous.  If you were friends, you should be seen volunteering.  At least  _ look _ like you care, Michael.”

Michael has never managed to stay mad at Isobel before, but right now, it’s too much.  Isobel is acting huffy, like Michael’s an idiot, like Michael isn’t screaming inside, wouldn’t tear a hole in reality with the force of his pain if it had even the slightest chance of bringing Alex back to life.  Michael hasn’t had to see Alex Manes’s father in fourteen days, and honestly,  _ never again _ is still probably too soon.  He keeps thinking about seeing the face of the man who killed Alex, smoothed from sadistic rage into a perfect, stoic portrait of parental grief, and he can’t...he just  _ can’t _ .

Unfortunately, while Max is understanding, Isobel has her mind made up, and when push comes to shove Max will always side with Isobel.  Which is how Michael finds himself loaded in the back seat of Max’s Jeep, headed for the volunteer staging area just off the 380, near the Manes’s house.

“Sorry,” Isobel says, not unsympathetically, as Michael throws himself in the backseat, “but you wanted information and this is how we get it.  It’s not like Jesse Manes is going to assault you in broad daylight.”

“Well, thanks,” Michael says, not meaning a word of it.  He hates how every word he says to Isobel comes out aggressive, but all their conversations lately are hostile.  In his better moments, Michael knows that it’s him who has changed, not Isobel, that she’s taken aback by how he’s started taking everything she says as an attack.  But most of the time he’s in too much pain to do anything but return fire when Isobel’s gentle directness accidentally bullseyes his weak spots. And the petty part of Michael says that if Isobel really cared, she would pay attention.  She would ask. It’s not like Isobel is the one who survived bad foster home after indifferent group home after outright dangerous foster home. It’s not like Isobel is the one who’s worked odd jobs under the table since he was twelve, watching money run through his fingers like water to pay for food and clothes that were supposed to come out of his foster parents’ stipends.  It’s not like Isobel is the one whose--whose  _ Alex _ is dead.

Michael has been protecting Isobel from his reality for years.  That now, when he’s thrown his future away to protect her from herself, it would tear them apart is a bitter pill to swallow.

Michael jerks back to the present as Max’s truck rumbles off of the paved road onto the gravel driveway of a cattle ranch about half a mile down from Alex’s family home.  “We’re here,” Max says unnecessarily. He and Isobel untangle themselves from seatbelts and supplies and climb out of the car.

Isobel pokes her head back in, glaring at him in the back seat, but Max has come around the hood, has an arm on her shoulder.  He says, “Leave it, Iz,” gently, and shuts the door. Michael listens to their footsteps crunch away until he’s alone. He needs a little more time to prepare, to collect his dispersed energy and brace himself for fighting with his instincts.  He needs to remind himself why he’s here, and why he’s not going to break down in front of Alex Manes’s father. Why he’s not going to kill Alex’s father today either.

Because Alex, brave and brash and kind, is counting on Michael to bring his father to justice.  To bring peace to Alex’s memory. Michael may not be the best choice for the job, but he’s what Alex has.  And Alex, even the memory of Alex, is worth everything Michael can give him. He takes a deep breath, and gets out of the car.

 

*

 

Michael isn’t sure what he expected the search to be like, but his brain is screaming from the combination of tedium and concentration.  Every time one of the volunteers in the line five feet to his left or right so much as shifts their bodyweight, Michael’s attention is jerked to them, and he flinches.  There are a lot of airmen helping with the grid search today, and to Michael’s hindbrain, desert camo means Alex’s dad.

It’s fruitless work, and they’ve been at it so long that the sun is setting.  Michael is both exhausted and unable to talk his body down from the surge of adrenaline he’s been riding since showing up at the staging site.

He startles as a radio crackles on the belt of the volunteer fifty feet down the line.  “Base says we’re done for the night! Pizza’s here!” The cheerfulness in the volunteer’s voice is obscene.

They troop back to the ranch, which is so much closer than it feels like they’ve gone.  Michael manages to pile up three slices of pizza before he gets a glare from some middle-aged mom who’s helping with food.  He finds Max and Isobel eating quietly by some fencing.

“So’s it done?” Michael asks quietly, heaving himself down next to them.

Max shakes his head.  “Jesse Manes didn’t show up until just now.  Guess they don’t want family members finding a body.”

“We wouldn’t either, if we didn’t know what we know,” Isobel points out.

“Yeah, well, we do, so what’s the plan now?” Michael says.

“I’ll talk to him,” Isobel says primly.

Michael thinks about arguing with her further, but his brain is still humming  _ danger, danger _ and he’s so bone-weary he can barely get individual thoughts to form.  “Sure, you do that,” he says.

Ten minutes later, she struts back from where she has been holding what from the outside seems like a sympathetic conversation with the distraught father of a school friend.

“He didn’t do it,” she says.

“Yes, he did.  He had to,” Michael responds, crossing his arms.

“No, he didn’t,” Isobel says.  She’s still in that vague half-trance state that follows the use of her powers.  “He found you together...went after you with the hammer...then threw Alex to the floor and left.  He was too worried you would tell someone. He thought Alex had come home, but never actually saw him.”  Her eyes refocus on Michael, and her mouth tips into a smirk, half amused, half disgusted. “Did you have sex with Alex Manes?”

“Yeah,” Michael admits.  “I guess that’s one word for it.”  It seems like too small a term to explain the feeling of Alex’s guitar calluses on his cheeks, the warmth of their shared laughter when Michael’s jeans got tangled around his ankles, the desublimation of Michael’s thoughts from chaos into a single, stable form.  The way Alex had rubbed his thumb across Michael’s cheek after and smiled. Isobel rolls her eyes at him, and for a second everything feels like it used to.

“Okay,” Max says, interrupting the moment.  “So if Sergeant Manes didn’t do it, who did?”

“Hold, please.”  Isobel’s eyes drift closed.  “A glowing handprint...a room with no windows, like an Air Force facility...Rosa Ortecho?”

Her eyes snap open again.

“An alien,” Isobel says, voice rising.  “Jesse thinks Alex was killed by an alien.  Just like Kate and Jasmine...and Rosa. He knows about us, he,  _ the government _ knows about us, and they think we killed his son.”


	3. Clovis, New Mexico

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Alex waits by the track switch all night, shivering.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks to: the Live Writing crew; chasingshadows, for advice on chapter structure; Tasyfa, for thoughts on outlining a story with music; haloud, for mixtape help and appreciating my plot diagram; and, as always, to InsidiousIntent for a thorough beta and flailing at all the right plot twists.
> 
> I am about to start a new job, which is likely to make my updates significantly slower. Thank you all for hanging with me--I finally have a sense of where the story is going, and I'm planning to finish it, even if it takes a while.
> 
>  **This chapter contains homeless Alex, and includes depictions of resource scarcity, lack of safety, and trauma response (especially hypervigilance).** Please take care of yourself.

_ Alex _

_ June 2008 _

 

Alex waits by the track switch all night, shivering.  It’s stupid; he definitely should have brought a heavier jacket, but his packing list has always revolved around living  _ in _ LA, not hiding strategically from the Livestock Auction security cameras hoping for a train going  _ to _ LA.  It’s four in the morning before there’s a freight train moving slow enough that Alex manages to haul himself onto a grain car.  From there, it’s a windy, dusty, terrifying ride through someplace, southeastern New Mexico.

Alex has studied his routes, knows this train can pretty much only be headed to Clovis, but for all he’s pored over town names on a map, he can’t quite seem to line them up with the metallic shrieks, the deceleration, the sudden burst of the train horn.  He’s zoned out from sleep deprivation and adrenaline crash, but he’s too afraid of getting caught, getting sent back, to let himself sleep.

Time dilates until Alex feels like he’s been frozen, turned into a statue in the corner of the car floor.  But the sun rises eventually, and Alex feels badly exposed when the train whooshes into a large railyard and comes to a stop.  His legs are shaky as he clambers out of the car and speedwalks towards some worn down factory buildings.

He’s starving, and he needs intel.  It’s so tempting for him to pop the battery and SIM card back in his phone, figure out where he is and where he’s going.  But that means Sarge could figure out the same things, so instead Alex heads towards Clovis’s erstwhile downtown, as defined by a handful of nearby skyscrapers.  He stuffs his hands in his pockets and walks fast, trying to look like he knows where he’s going.

It’s a longer walk to downtown than Alex thought it would be.  Alex assumes, based on the similarities between Clovis and Roswell, that if he wanted to he could probably find a church somewhere in the downtown area.  Alex’s family has never been big on religion, but Alex went to Mass once or twice with the Valentis when he was a kid. A church would mean donuts and coffee, but even without the makeup Alex feels like there’s a neon sign over his head reading “GAY AND RUNAWAY.”  So he skips the Spanish-speaking Metropolitan Community Church, whatever the hell that is, and the Potter’s House Christian Fellowship. It’s a good twelve blocks, to the point where Alex has almost given up on avoiding churches and is trying to remember enough about the FCA kids at New Roswell to do some kind of “regular youth group-goer” impression, before he finds an open taqueria.

The coffee is shitty, but ten bucks gets him enough food to make up for not having eaten in 18 hours or so, and none of the waitstaff seem at all interested in the lone teenager downing coffee and eggs in the corner.  When he’s done, he leaves a couple crumpled bills on the table and asks the server where the library is.

“Uh, it’s like a three block walk that way,” the server says, pointing east, “but I don’t think it’s open today.”

“That’s okay, thanks,” Alex says, smiling his best customer service smile, but inwardly his heart is sinking.  He needs to get to a computer. He needs to find the Greyhound Station, and he needs to find out what time the first bus out of here is, and he needs to go.  Clovis is too close to Roswell for Alex to relax, it’s an unfamiliar AO, and, worst of all, it’s too fucking close to Cannon.

Sarge is a recruiter now, and nominally affiliated with Hollowell, but when Alex was little, back before his mom left and Sarge got promoted, they were stationed at Cannon. Alex knows he looks like a Manes, can see the stamp of his father in the lines of his own face. Despite the fact that downtown Clovis seems pretty empty on a Sunday morning, Alex can’t shake the feeling that any second he’s going to run into some senior NCO who recognizes him as “the littlest Manes boy.”

The waiter is right on all counts: the walk to the library takes less than five minutes and exactly three blocks—and the library is in fact closed on Sundays.

Alex is beginning to feel floaty and unreal from exhaustion.  He sits on one of the benches outside the library and contemplates his options, shedding his flannel when the temperature starts climbing.  He’s been deep in his thoughts for a lot longer than he means to be, staring at the ground unseeing, when the crackle of tires pulling into the dusty parking lot jerks him to attention.

Shit.  It’s a cop.

Running isn’t an option; he knows from long experience with Sarge that running only makes authority types more suspicious.  And he’s--middle class, kind of, and white passing, mostly, so. He sits. Consciously stops his knee from bouncing.

The cop gets out of the car, says something into his radio, walks toward Alex.  He’s young and white, which in Alex’s experience with the Sarge’s baby airmen means either naive or trigger-happy.

“Officer,” Alex says, as politely as he can.  He doesn’t know how successful his polite voice is right now.  The part of him deep inside that always snarls when cornered seems a lot closer to the surface than usual.

“Library’s closed, kid,” the cop says.

Now is not the time to be telling a power-tripping asshole with a gun that the library is public property and Alex has done nothing wrong.  Besides, it's not entirely true: Alex is sure there's a status charge waiting for him in Chaves County for running away, and mouthing off to law enforcement is likely to trigger a quick trip to a holding cell in juvie there. Alex swallows, tries to keep his hands from balling into fists.

The problem is, now that there’s a solid threat in front of Alex, all his fear has vaporized, leaving only simmering heat behind.  It takes most of Alex’s concentration not to say  _ I’m not a fucking kid _ .  He takes a deep breath.

“I’m just waiting for my mom to come get me.”  It’s several seconds before Alex realizes that the words--that even, conciliatory tone--have come out of his mouth.  But it’s a good lie, reasonable, nonthreatening, so he adds, “Youth group got out early.”

The cop’s posture bends slightly.  His voice is slower when he asks, “How much longer til she gets here?”

Alex makes a show of checking his watch.  “Fifteen minutes, maybe half an hour? Sometimes she’s late.”

The cop scowls at him, but it doesn’t have heat in it.  “Look, kid, if you’re still here in an hour when I swing back by, I’m going to have to book you for loitering.  So if your mom isn’t here in half an hour, walk back over to your church and call her, okay?”

“Sure thing,” Alex says, with a smile that he only lets turn sarcastic once the officer’s back is turned.

So much for thinking through his options.  The aftermath of confrontation, even one this small and successful, has left Alex jittery with adrenaline.  He waits until the police car pulls away, makes himself count to three hundred, then heads in the opposite direction from where the cop went.  He’s sweating and sticky in his jeans, and he can’t get into a good running rhythm and handle his guitar case, but he manages a sprint-walk that satisfies his need to  _ move _ .

Sarge has put Alex through PT under worse circumstances, so Alex soon settles into a sustainable jog.  He’s only been moving for 15 minutes or so when he hits a large park.  _ Hillcrest _ , the sign at the entrance says.

Alex figures he at least won’t get kicked out for hanging out in a park on a pretty summer afternoon--hell, on his reconnaissance lap around the property, he spots at least ten other teenagers doing the same thing, and plenty of adults and kids sprawled out on the grass.  Several are even taking naps. He picks a shady spot out of the way of foot traffic, curls protectively around his guitar case, and plants his head on his backpack. Alex closes his eyes.

 

*

 

Three hours of broken sleep only makes Alex more tired, but at least it’s better than nothing.  When he can’t make himself sleep anymore, he forces himself to go for a brisk walk to wake up, then sets up with his guitar outside the entrance to the zoo.  He picks his spot carefully: close enough to make a little cash, far enough to claim he’s just playing for fun, not busking, even if he does have his guitar case propped open and seeded with change from breakfast.

He’s made enough money to cover that breakfast, but not much more, when the zoo closes at four.  He picks another spot, close to the splash park but not  _ too _ close, but the knot in his stomach has returned and he’s hyper-aware of every person that walks by, unreasonably sure that they’re going to be park security or Air Force.  It doesn’t take long before he gives up and relocates to a more secluded spot. He noodles around on his own songs a little bit, but the last song he was working on was about Michael Guerin and he can’t even think about it without--well, anyway, he gives up on that too.  Puts his guitar away and pops his earbuds in, listens to the loudest, fastest songs he has and lets the music wash away his feelings the way it always does.

Eventually he heads back to the taqueria for dinner, drags out his enchiladas as long as he can, but they close at nine on Sundays, so he wanders around downtown Clovis until it’s late enough that a guy with a guitar case might attract the wrong kind of attention.

He’s pretty sure it’s early enough that the cops are still swinging through Hillcrest Park regularly, but it’s the only place he’s seen all day that might make a good spot to sleep.  He drags his guitar case into the playground tunnel with him, throws his flannel and hoodie back on, and tries to sleep.

He must sleep at some point, because it gets light sooner than he thinks it should, but Alex could swear that he didn’t sleep for more than a handful of minutes at a time the whole night.  Every sound--cars, insects, his own breathing--jolts him awake, sure someone has found him. 

When he starts to hear the jingle of dog collars and the thud of morning joggers’ feet, he wiggles carefully out of the tunnel, waits until no one is going past to hop down from the play structure and stride purposefully toward the park entrance.  At this point, his teeth taste disgusting, and Alex is pretty sure that he’s starting to take on that dusty, unshowered homeless person look.

There’s a gas station on the northeast side of the park, so he parts with a couple bucks in exchange for the largest cup of burned coffee he can get.  He decides to skip the suspicious looking egg-and-sausage biscuits.

It’s still too early to go to the library, so Alex wanders up and down Prince Street, looking in the windows of mattress stores and pawn shops to pass the time.  There’s a Family Dollar four blocks down from 7th Street, and it’s open at 8am, so Alex buys overpriced deodorant and toothpaste and dry shampoo.

It feels like Alex counts every second between 8:45 and 9:00 am.  When his watch finally ticks over, he forces himself to walk as slowly as he can stand back up Prince towards the library.

The Clovis-Carver Public Library has the beige walls and fluorescent lighting of a public building that hasn’t been renovated in the past twenty years. It also has log-in screens on the public computer, and from the posted signs, Alex determines that the login is tied to Curry County library accounts.  He could probably get around that, given enough time, but there are only a handful of people in the library at the moment, and Alex feels conspicuous. Instead, he browses the meager young adult section, keeping one eye out for someone walking away from a computer without logging out of the system. After a half hour, he finds a chair and flips half-heartedly through Volume 2 of  _ Y: The Last Man _ for about the fiftieth time.

By 10am, the library starts filling with patrons--adults with bulky laptops and stacks from the non-fiction section, moms with young kids, even a couple other bored-looking teenagers.  Once all the computers are full, it doesn’t take long for Alex to take over smoothly from a middle-aged woman who is finished checking her email. He finds the Greyhound website and nearly groans aloud when he discovers that the first bus out of Clovis isn’t until tomorrow.  The one-way ticket from Clovis to Los Angeles (by way of a zig-zag east to fucking Amarillo) feels risky, but it’s an extra fifty bucks he doesn’t have to get to Albuquerque and then buy an LA ticket.

Alex carefully sketches a map and directions to the Greyhound station on one of the million slips of paper the library has for patrons to write call numbers down.  Ironically, his path will take him back down Prince St, right past the railyard where he arrived. It’s going to be a good three mile walk, so Alex decides to wait it out until the late afternoon, when the sun isn’t quite so searing.  He clears his browser history and cookies before logging out of “Richmond, Karen”’s account.

He’s always had good relationships with librarians, so he gets permission to leave his guitar behind the circulation desk for an hour to go back to the taqueria and wolf down another large plate of eggs.  When he returns, he settles down in a corner with a battered paperback copy of Michael Chrichton’s  _ Prey,  _ the familiar discord between Jack and Julia falling over him like a blanket. 

At four pm he makes himself stir, stretching the numbness out of his legs.  He passes the book back to the circulation librarian with a quiet “thank you,” ducks into the library bathroom to brush his teeth, then starts out.  It’s a long, sweaty walk, but now that he’s finally getting the fuck out of New Mexico, there’s something nostalgic in the trip. Goodbye, fake adobe storefronts.  Goodbye, saltbrush and mesquite. Goodbye, New Mexico, it’s been a fucking blast.

The sun is setting by the time Alex gets to the Greyhound stop.  It takes a mortifying amount of time to figure out that he has to get his ticket from the Cortex gas station, but a lap around the inside so slow the clerk probably suspects him of shoplifting finally nets him a discrete “Greyhound tickets sold here” sign by the front door.

In the end, Alex can’t make himself say the words “Los Angeles” out loud this close to Roswell, even though splitting the tickets up is gonna cost him.  “Uh, one for Amarillo, please?” he asks the clerk.

“You’re late, kid.  Greyhound sales stop at 5pm.”

“Sorry,” Alex replies breathlessly.  “I couldn’t figure out where I was supposed to buy them.”

The clerk shrugs.  “Whatever. It’s fine.  You want the one tonight?”

Alex blinks.  Tonight? He had thought he was gonna have to sleep in someone’s wheat field, but it’s true he only looked up itineraries to Albuquerque or LA.

“Uh, sure.”  He puts on his resting-Sarge-face, keeping his emotions off his face while he waits for the clerk to process the ticket.  Alex is sure that the ticketing system is the slowest computer system he’s ever encountered, and the clerk’s hunt-and-peck typing is not helping.

Finally, the clerk looks up and asks, “Name?”

“Alex.  Uh, Alexander.”

“Last name?”

The name on Alex’s fake ID is Alex Martin, but it suddenly feels too prosaic.   Alex is finally getting out. He’s finally going to be free.

He raises his head, meets the clerk’s eyes.

“It’s Guerin.  Alex Guerin.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you need resources for/about runaway youth in the US, a good place to start is the National Runaway Safeline: 1-800-RUN-AWAY (1-800-786-2929) or 1800runaway.org.


	4. The Truth

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Spare me,” Isobel snaps.  “I am not stupid, and I know when I’m being lied to.  I want to know the truth.” She unbuckles her seatbelt loudly, like punctuation.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to Ess Cee (@InsidiousIntent) and Jes (@JoCarthage) for the beta read. The blame for the mindscape stuff rests solely on Jes.

_ Michael _

_ June 2008 _

 

“Obviously, you didn’t kill Alex,” Isobel says.  The three of them have driven away from Technical Sergeant Manes and the search party, instinctively headed for a place that feels close to home.  Max has killed the engine on the Jeep, but the lights are still on, illuminating the scrubby rangeland that has grown over the spot where they all fell to earth.  “At this point, I’m not even sure you killed Rosa. Jesse Manes thinks Rosa died of a glowing handprint on her face. You don’t leave glowing handprints, Michael.”

Michael scrambles for an answer.  “Max does, though. And you know he’s the kind of dumbass who would try to heal--”

“Spare me,” Isobel snaps.  “I am not stupid, and I know when I’m being lied to.  I want to know the truth.” She unbuckles her seatbelt loudly, like punctuation.

Max says “Iz” in a placating tone of voice, but Michael cuts him off.  “You got me. You’re right. Isobel, I didn’t kill Rosa Ortecho. You did.”

Max reacts instantly, twisting in the driver’s seat to glare at Michael in the back.  “What the hell, Michael? You said we needed to protect her.”

Michael seethes.  “No,  _ I  _ said call the police.  Call your parents. I said get help from somebody who knows how to deal with a fugue state, or multiple personalities, or whatever this is.   _ You _ said Isobel was too special.  No offense, Iz, I think you’re special, just...maybe not ‘go to jail for you’ special.  You know what I’m saying?”

“That is  _ bullshit! _ ” Max yells.  “ _ You _ said she was gonna be fine!  And then  _ you _ said, ‘I did it’ when she asked.   _ I _ did not make  _ you _ do anything!”

Michael is about to respond when Isobel starts laughing.  It’s not a pleasant laugh, half air and half pain. She has a smile twisted onto her face like it’s been sewn there.  Michael has seen a smile almost like that before, on an Isobel wearing black and snapping three girls’ necks. His whole body is suddenly cold, like ice has been injected through his veins.

“Isobel?” he asks, tentatively, leaning over the center console to get a better look.  “Is that you?”

She laughs again, and this time Michael recognizes that it’s not wrong-Isobel, mirror-Isobel, it’s just an Isobel more angry than he has ever seen before.

“Only you,” she says slowly, building speed as she goes.  “Only you two could make a conversation about why no one  _ told _ me that I’m a psychotic killer into a who-said-what about  _ not telling me I’m a psychotic killer! _ ”

Max has switched to puppy dog eyes before Michael recovers his voice.  “Come on, Iz, you know we were trying to protect you. It’s not a particularly easy thing to bring up in conversation, you know?  ‘Sorry about your blackout, some fucked up part of your brain killed three girls from our school and we didn’t know what to do about it because you were unconscious and there was evidence everywhere…”

Isobel has gone very pale.  “Max,” Michael hisses, tipping his head towards Isobel, just as Isobel says tightly, “You’re not actually helping.”

“Because you were being so helpful,” Max snipes, but the heat has gone out of it. There’s a short, uncomfortable silence where they all stare resolutely straight ahead, towards where their--what?  their home? their alien SUV?--had ended in a nosedive and scorched grass. 

“What do you need right now?” Michael asks, low.

Isobel laughs that broken laugh again. “I don’t know, maybe for my brothers not to lie to me? I don’t know which is worse, if you think I’m too psycho to find out or just too weak.”

“It’s not like that,” Max growls but Isobel talks over him.

“And then there’s your clear failure to handle a crime scene.” She gives a weak smile, but a real one.  “This is why we leave the details—“

“—to the event planner,” Michael and Max chorus at her.  

“Well.  Future event planner,” Isobel says, and flutters her eyelashes beatifically.  Max huffs a familiar faux-exasperated sigh from the driver’s seat. He’s clearly relieved at how well Isobel is taking everything.

Michael can’t seem to reach that relieved feeling; it’s trapped under the cold, hard layer of dread in his mind that he can’t get to thaw.  There’s a vision in Michael’s head of Alex, screaming, while Isobel caresses his face darkly, then snaps his neck. There’s a vision of Alex’s body, crumpled in a corner of one of the hundreds of caves within a 50 mile radius of Roswell.  Alex is dead, but Michael still can’t shake the feeling that Alex is vulnerable, even lonely without him.

“--Jesse Manes?” Michael hears Isobel say, and he wrenches his attention back to the conversation. 

“If he thinks you did it, we need more information,” Max says.  “There were only three bodies in that cave, so he must know something we don’t.”  He glances at Isobel guiltily. “Uh, sorry, Iz.”

Michael hears Isobel inhale noisily.  “It is what it is,” she says firmly. “I’m just going to have to wait until after we deal with the government conspiracy, and then I can have a breakdown.”

“What if you kill someone else before that?” Michael demands.  His anger ignites. It feels deep, deep the way his powers feel, a well drilled down to some sunken ancient ocean.  Alex is--everything, but also only a spark, taken to the millenia of crushed things Michael has distilled into oil.

Max glares at Michael.  “We can take care of her.  Whatever it takes. Twenty four hour watch, something.  I promise, Isobel, we won’t let this happen to you again.”

Michael laughs, and to his own ears it’s an even worse sound than Isobel’s laugh was.  “Happen to  _ Isobel _ ?  Right, because she’s definitely the victim here.  Not like anyone  _ died _ or anything.”

“I didn’t do it on purpose!” Isobel insists.  “Why would you think that? Alex Manes may have been your booty call but I’m having blackouts, and waking up covered in blood, Michael, and I--I--what’s  _ wrong _ with you?  I am terrified here, and I need my brother, and you’re, what, you’re mad at me?  Get it through your head, this wasn’t me. I didn’t intend to do anything like this.  I wanted to have a killer  _ prom,  _ yeah, but not Carrie-style!  I wanted a graduation party and a college orientation and a sorority.  I didn’t want to kill anyone!”

Isobel is sobbing now, hand over her mouth sagged across the center console into Max’s shoulder. Max rubs his hand in soothing circles on Isobel’s back, and something about it reminds Michael of the night Alex gave him the guitar. Isobel and Max might have Michael, but they also have each other, and Michael doesn’t have  _ them _ . Alex is the only person who ever stayed, hovering just inside Michael’s reach, waiting until Michael was ready to stretch out his hand and take hold.

It never bothered Michael before Alex, having no one. It never felt like anything until it felt like a roiling gulf of emptiness.

“He didn’t mean it,” Max says soothingly to Isobel, looking meaningfully at Michael.  “He’s hurting too, Iz, he didn’t mean it.”

Max’s condescending tone is the last straw for Michael.  “I did mean it,” Michael snaps. He lets his powers roll up through him, unbuckling his seatbelt.  “You work on a plan to keep her safe all you want. I’m not giving a single shit about Alex Manes’s father and what he knows until we’ve come up with a plan to keep Roswell safe from her.”  The passenger door slams open, a vent for powers that, just now, feel like the surge of a capacitor discharging. The ground shakes a little as Michael turns away.

He hears Max yelling after him, and the Jeep following, but he just keeps walking, eyes on the starry sky, unseeing through the hot tears that fill his eyes but refuse to fall.

 

*

 

Three days later, Michael jolts awake in the cab of his truck to someone banging on the window.  He groans, stiff from contorting himself to fit on the seat, and glares at Isobel, who rolls her eyes and glares back at him.  She dangles the spare key for the truck in front of the window, smirks, and resumes pounding on the glass.

Michael shoves himself upwards and towards the driver’s door, then opens the door rapidly enough that Isobel has to jump out of the way to avoid getting hit.

“What,” Michael says, refusing to turn it into a question.

“Safety plan,” Isobel says brightly.  She’s probably being too high-pitched and too loud on purpose to get to Michael; she sounds like a cheerleader in some stupid teen movie.

“What,” Michael says again.

“You said you didn’t want to see me until there was a safety plan.  Well, now, there’s a safety plan. You’re days, Max is nights.”

“Excuse me?”

“That’s right.  I’ve decided you’re not going to let me out of your sight for longer than it takes for me to go to the bathroom for as long as it takes for you to decide I’m safe or for one of us to go truly nuts.”  Isobel smiles beatifically.

Michael knows from experience that the more innocent Isboel’s smile is, the more vicious she’s being.  That makes this Isobel’s punishment for Michael running off the other night. The trouble is, it’s also a good idea.  If Isobel is spending all her time with Michael, Michael can keep her and everyone else safe. And he can do a little prying too.

“Great,” he says sarcastically, because Isobel expects it.  “Use those--” he nods at her keys “--on the other side, and let’s go.”

“Go?” Isobel asks, confused.

“Yeah,” Michael says, and allows the shit-eating grin he’s been holding back to bloom over his face.  “I’m working at Sanders’ Auto. You get to hang out with me at the junkyard all day. Hope you dressed for 110 degrees!”

Michael shouldn’t be surprised at how good company Isobel is, but given how angry he’s been feeling at her lately, it’s a shock to be reminded of how Isobel can keep up a funny stream of gossip, and then let the conversation trail off at just the right time when Michael needs silence.  By the time he takes a break for lunch, their relationship feels comfortable enough again for Michael to offer quietly, “Thanks. Sorry I’ve been so shitty lately.”

Isobel smiles, answers just as quietly.  “I get it. You’re scared. You lost someone important.  I’m scared too. I’m trying not to think about it, but Michael, I’m really scared.  I don’t know what’s  _ real _ , you know?  I don’t remember any of it.  I wish there was some way to find out the truth, but I guess it’s just locked away in my head.”

Something clicks in Michael’s brain at Isobel’s words, and a wave of giddy warmth washes over him.  He almost laughs out loud.

“What are you smiling about?” Isobel asks, the beginnings of indignation in her tone.  “If you’re mean again about all these things I can’t control, I’m leaving, safety plan or not.”

“No, sorry,” Michael says.  “It’s not that. It’s just, I know what we need to do.”

 

*

 

Max is not convinced.  “We’ve been over this. It’s not like Isobel in mindspace knows any more than Isobel in real life does.  The truth thing only works on what Isobel knows to be true. Last week if we asked her if she killed Rosa, she would have said ‘no.’  And now she can only say ‘yes.’ It doesn’t prove anything.”

They’re sitting by Michael’s truck, parked out by Foster’s ranch again.  The sky is streaking orange and pink, fading into a deep violet blue, and they have their $10 Walmart lawn chairs parked around a small brushy fire.

“Yeah, but she said it herself,” Michael replies.  “‘It’s locked away in my head.’ Isobel was  _ there _ when she blacked out.  Just because she can’t access her memories doesn’t mean they don’t exist.  It’s like, completing a circuit!” He leans forward, props his chin on his tented hands.

“I don’t think it’ll work,” Max says again.

“Max, get over yourself,” Isobel chimes in.  She’s curled up in Michael’s sleeping bag, but she looks more relaxed than Michael has seen her since before Rosa and Alex.  “Like Michael always says, we’re aliens. Only the, um, only the universe knows what exactly we can do.”

“Whatever,” Max says.  “You know I’ll try. I just don’t think it will work.”

“Complaint noted,” Michael says sarcastically.  “Let’s get on with it, Iz, the night’s wasting.”

“Where do you have to be?” Isobel fires back.  She starts to say something else, then stops herself.  “Sorry. Let’s do this. For Alex.” She closes her eyes.

Michael feels himself pulled towards his mindscape.  He resists, reaches out to drop a hand on Isobel’s arm.

"What?” she says.

“Not for Alex,” he says. “Iz.  Let’s do this for  _ you _ .”

When he blinks open his--do you call them  _ inner eyes? _ Michael shudders at the idea--psychedelic blurry brain Isobel has teared up.

It's an awkward few seconds of static, Michael fighting against the urge to blurt out his deepest secrets that always pulls at him when he enters Isobel's brainspace.

“I didn’t want you to cry!” he says finally, dismayed, and then more dismayed because even if it's not his most guarded secret it is the unvarnished truth, escaping from his mouth without permission.  Michael always has trouble with thinking before he speaks, but he tries to be careful in Isobel’s head. He has sometimes said things, foster care things and feelings things, that he really wasn’t ready to talk about.

“It’s good for me,” Isobel says, and smiles a watery smile.

“Well it makes me incredibly uncomfortable,” Michael says.  He tries to drawl his words as much as possible, to cover for the honesty being torn out of him.

Being Max, the first thing Max says as he blinks into existence is “Shut up, Michael.”

Michael resists the urge to say “shut up, Max”--who knows what unintentional truth Isobel’s brain will turn  _ that _ into--and instead finds himself asking, “So, is everyone ready to do this?”

Max says, “Honestly, our powers scare the shit out of me.  I don’t want to feel out of control.”

Which of course is not something Michael had realized because--”Jesus, Max, some days my powers are the only thing that feel  _ in _ control.  We’re aliens, does that really scare you that much?”

“Yes!” Max yells.  “I didn’t ask for this.  I just want to fit in.”

Ugh.  That’s two out of two siblings Michael has upset in a five minute period.  He’s on some kind of hot streak.

“I don’t understand that,” he tells Max baldly.  “I never did. But I know it matters to you, and I love you.” Oh yeah, he totally said that out loud.  “So just let me take the lead on the alien stuff, okay?”

Max coughs awkwardly.  “Thank you, Michael. I love you too.”

“Aww,” Isobel coos, because she is a cold-hearted bitch, “isn’t that sweet?  And now that you’re all made up, are we ready to do this?” Well. Cold-hearted bitch, but also his sister.

“Yeah, okay,” Max says.

“I was hatched ready,” Michael says, and he means every word.

 

*

 

They spend suspended endless moments working in Isobel’s mindspace.  That first day they experiment until they’re exhausted and the mindspace is turning a little grey at the edges.  They try holding hands, and not holding hands. They try mentally willing Isobel’s powers to grow. Max thinks sexy thoughts--”I did not need to know that about Liz Ortecho”--and tries to zap Isobel with electricity.  Michael succeeds in floating all three of them in the air, which he thinks is pretty impressive compared to the other two, but--it’s not helpful, Michael, what are you doing, Michael, put me down, Michael.

It’s two weeks of steady practice.  Michael feels the well of his powers widening, growing to hold the greater flow rate he needs to draw on with this much use.

Finally, Isobel stops them.  “Maybe those memories didn’t form,” she says.  “Like I was on autopilot.”

“No, look,” Michael says.  “I was there. That was not you on autopilot.  I know you on autopilot and you listen to too much Mariah Carey and doodle our alien symbol thing in your notebook and you used to kinda hit on Rosa Ortecho.”

Isobel looks confused and a little disgusted.

“Okay, maybe not that last one--wait.  You really don’t think you were hitting on Rosa?”

“I mean, she’s got that bad girl thing going for her and her hair is incredible.  Ugh, that’s so not the point. No, I don’t think I ever hit on Rosa, and it’s in really poor taste for you to ask me--”

Something flickers.  Later, Michael can’t quite explain what, whether it’s like a blink or the lights going out or a tiny stroke--just something is wrong, and then it isn’t.

“Say that again,” Michael says.

“It’s in poor taste to turn whatever I did to Rosa into some sort of evil lesbians thing.”

“Not that,” Michael says impatiently, “the part about never hitting on her.”

“Seriously?  I just--”

“Iz,” Max breaks in.  “Just--do it one more time, okay?”

Isobel’s hand goes to her hip.  “I never hit on Rosa Ortecho.”

The world flickers again.

“Yeah,” says Max, a little breathless, “yeah, Michael, I see it too.”

“What do you see?” Isobel asks.  “Come on, it’s my brain in here.”

“Exactly,” Michael says.  “I guess it knows when you’re lying even if you don’t.”

“Ludicrous yet plausible,” Max says dryly.

“Oh, what do you know,” Isobel says.

“Let’s try closing the circuit one more time,” Michael says, and “no, Max, spark  _ me _ ” because all of a sudden he sees.  The brain runs on electrical impulses, electricity means  _ information _ , and Max’s power--it’s all electricity.  They’ve been running off the theory that Max can jumpstart something, anything, but no, Max doesn’t have enough energy for that all at once, he needs an accumulator.  And Michael stores some kind of potential energy because you can’t get kinetic energy from nothing--

\--the wrongness grows, steadies--

\--Max’s hand sparks Michael again, as he feeds electrical potentials to Isobel, a conduit, because he’s not a _well_ , he’s a _battery_ \--

\--the connection breaks and he’s dropped abruptly from Isobel’s mind into the blues and browns of Max’s bedroom.  Michael blinks away the electrical diagrams writing themselves behind his eyelids to see--

“Hello,” says Isobel, only it’s not Isobel.  “I wasn’t expecting you this soon.” And then she falls.


End file.
